Android 7.1.2 Nougat rolling out to select Nexus devices; should you upgrade?

After conducting beta testing for more than a month, Google's Android team has released the new Nougat v7.1.2 update to select devices.

Nexus Play and Pixel C notebook are the only Google affiliated gadgets to have received the new update, which is said to weigh around 340MB in size, Android Police reported.

The company had performed beta testing on Pixel, Pixel XL, Nexus 6P and Nexus 5X. So, the v7.1.2 update is certain to reach the aforementioned devices in coming days and later to other third-party phone brands including the recently launched Samsung Galaxy S8 and LG G6 series.

The new update has enabled Nexus Player and Pixel C to recognise fingerprint gesture features. They also get new launcher app seen in the Pixel phones and option to choose where (home/lock screen or both) to put live wallpapers.

Further, v7.1.2 also brings new battery usage alert option, which shows a list of apps draining the phone's cell.

It is believed that Android v7.1.2 might be the last of the Nougat series update to be released to the devices before the official launch of the Android O, which is scheduled to be deployed to all eligible smart devices in the third quarter of 2017.

In the mean time, Google will continue to release monthly security updates to its devices. This process became mandatory in late 2015 after the emergence of Stagefright bug, which is touted as the mother of all Android Vulnerability.

The previous version v7.1.1 was marred with serious bug that affected the performance of the Motorola Nexus 6. Later, Google downgraded 2014 flagship back to v7.0 and is yet to release a glitch-free version of the v7.1.1 to the Nexus 6.